Norman Herrick
A Trooper, sheriff, hired gun, scalp hunter and Senator all wrapped into one colossal monster of a man named Norman Herrick. A former NCR trooper turned merc turned sheriff turned scalp hunter turned politician Norman has seen his fair share of death and isn't afraid to spread it around. Biography Early Years When Norman was born he wasn't born to some big and rich Cattle Baron or Tobacco Planter heck he wasn't even born in the town he would spend the rest of his life in. He was born in the good town of Goodsprings in the Mojave wasteland to Julius and Maria Herrick, they along with Norman's grandparents and uncle lived on a small "ranch" outside of town. The ranch he in fact lived upon was nothing more than two old pre-war campers that someone had towed to an old campsite and had promptly forgotten when the Great War began. Either way he and his parents lived in one trailer and his grandparents the other, as for his uncle...no one really knows where he went during the night albeit its not completely out of the question to say that he lived in the old Jean Sky Diving shack. When it came down to waking up and working the small herd of Bighorners they kept on the ranch his mother and father did most of the work, his grandparents tended to the family garden that helped feed them all and his uncle worked wherever he was needed, however he was quite the inventor his uncle making useful equipment out of seemingly random objects for an example he made a water purifier out of a hot plate, some electronics an old butter knife and a whole shit ton of Rad-Away. Other than being good with thinking crap up he also was rather handy with a gun and on more than one occassion had to chase off bandits, wildlife, cattle rustlers, thieves and all other manner of ruffians, thus he was greatly relieved when the NCR took over the old Prison and got it working again. However the correctional facility didn't keep all bandits away and each passing day he had to chase off some manner of thug, perhaps that was why he stayed away from the family he knew that whatever friends, crews or allies these thugs had would likely come after him at some point. As Norman grew up he found that helping out his friendly uncle was his favorite part of the work around the ranch and thus he stuck with his uncle for most of a days work. He would wake up, find his uncle warmin himself around a big billowing fire and cooking some brahmin steak for breakfast, than he would help him drag buckets of water down from Goodsprings Source, feed the water through the purifier and then help him work on some new invention his uncle had cooked up. Every so often his uncle would even allow him to shoot at Geckos with his .357 Magnum and as he grew he became quite proficient with the old magnum. One day when he was 15 he awoke to find his uncle eating some steak and after joining him for some lunch he and his uncle went up to the source to fetch the days water, as they filled their buckets they suddenly heard shouting, than gunfire, looking back at the ranch they could see men with guns running about the place. His uncle turned pale, pulled his .357 and ran towards the ranch his old cowboy hat falling off his head as he did, Norman followed but quickly stopped running over to small clutter of bushes hereached into it and pulled out an old Varmiant Rifle, he'd found it along the road one day along with a few clips of ammo and had spent his free time fixing it up and during the nights he'd sneak away to practice shooting it. He grabbed the rifle checked the clip he had loaded and raced down towards the ranch. When he reached it he saw a body laying on the ground, it was his grandfather his old 10mm Pistol next to him. The bandits were working their way along the side of the ranch when he heard the rapid fire staccato of his father's 12.7mm SMG, followed by a hail of bullets landing around the trailer where his parents and uncle were hiding. Shouldering his rifle he took aim with the rusted sights on a single bandit running between cover and fired he was hit smack in the face by his round. Shocked by his own kill he watched the man fall and his confused compatriots duck behind their cover. He took aim at another bandit and squeezed the trigger, sending the ruffian down in a mist of pink blood. He repeated killing two more of the bandits when suddenly he felt a smack on the side of his head, he came to, finding his family tied up and the leader of the bandits staring him down. The bandit leader introduced himself as Burt Walston, leader of the Walston Gang. He had a proposition for Norman, since he proved to be such a good shot with his rifle he thought that it should be no problem hitting a flying hat, his offer was if you can hit his hat with an old .357 than he and his family could go free. Norman accepted, as Burt tossed the hat up he watched it...time seemed to slow down as he took aim with his revolver and as the hat fluttered back down to the ground he squeezed the trigger letting of a single round, the hat jumped in the air and hit the ground. Burt went up to it and looked it over, there was no hole. suddenly the whole crew of bandits began to cheer as they shot his parents, uncle and grandmother through the back of the head and Burt came up to Norman and levled his revolver with the kid and shot him twice in the chest Norman collapsed and vlacked out. He came to staring into the face of an man with surgical scrubs on he was at the small town of Primm, the people of Goodsprings had found him and his family, seeing that he was still alive they rushed him to Primm where there was an NCR Surgeaon. He had been saved by the NCR. Serving with the Bear As Norman woke from his surgery a young Lieutenant with the NCR Army delievered the bad news to him, that not only had the gang killed his family but they had made off with their small pack of Bighorners essentially bankrupting Norman. As he left the tent he was in he comtemplted how he would go forward, he had no home, no family and no herd he was pretty much screwed from where he stood. However as he looked upon the small camp he realised that he had only one true home left, the NCR Army. So he re-entered the tent and asked the Lieutenant where he could sign up, the officer shocked by his sudden determination retrieved the papers and returned with them having Norman fill them out, he was then given orders to report to Camp McCarran in one week. After a bit of haggling he managed to snag a ride with a troop of mounted military police men escorting convicts to their execution at McCarran. He arrived a full week early and voluntarily began to train with other fresh face recruits. When he had spent his manadtory five weeks in the training facilites he was given his orders to report to Major Edward Ewell commander of the 22nd Mounted Infantry Regiment "The War Horse Regiment" as it was nicknamed. These soldiers set out to help sieze an old Enclave base that high command thought to hold valuable tech but mostly more vertibirds and energy weapons. The base was located in Northern Nevada and mostly out of the reach of the NCR however the Enclave troops there had begun to launch raids against the NCR bases and villages within California and thus had to be eliminated to spare valuable troops from beingspent defending border towns rather than on the frontlines or patrolling the interior. The 22nd arrived off the base's perimeter several days later Major Ewell not wanting to waste troops with a foolish frontal assault wanted to send in a small scouting force to test the defenses and gauge the strength of the Enclave forces there and thus allow Ewell to know how to go forward. When he went looking for volunteers Norman, eager to prove himself to the hardened veterans of the 22nd volunteered to go on the raid. They set off several minutes later, on foot down the mountainside the spied the tall walls of the base and the imposing guard towers. The Enclave were here in strength with at least 200 power armored troopers alone and go knows how many other personnel. However the numbers weren't as imposing to the NCR (they had a regiment after all) it was taking the base fast enough, the Enclave troops they were facing were known as the Black Vipers they had a history of jumping bases, one fell to the NCR or BoS they'd find another and soon enough they'd be raiding the NCR again. They were identifiable by the two red lines that went down the length of their black power armor and boke off at their legs, rather noticeable with a black background. The troopers moved stealthly they had fought these bastards before and knew their tactics. They would preiodically napalm the area around their base to clear out any snooping wastelanders and possible infiltrators along with creating a killing field for their forces. Many times the 22nd and many other NCR units of all kind and description had tried to take out the Black Vipers but they were a slippery foe, attacks from the sea proved too slow, from the air also proved futile as the Vipers were excellent vertibird pilots it was only full scale ground attacks that proved semi-successful, down on the ground the Enclave's small numbers would be overwhelmed by the vastly superior numbers of the NCR and troopers could sweep across the base capturing or killing anyone who resisted. However the families and few civilians that came with the Black Vipers were well versed in quick evacuations and as soon as the alarm went up the civilians could be up in the air and off in just a few minutes. As they scanned the base they could see that the Enclave hadn't dug in too well and that they were relying upon foot patrols and their airstrikes to catch whatever charging troops in the open. After several hours of observation the leader of the group decided it was time to depart when suddenly there was a shot, to this day Norman couldn't figure out where it came from but instantly the base was in action as the troopers suddenly began to fire into the brush. Realising that the element of suprise was up the troopers began to open fire on the guards, the troopers trained from their campaigns against the Brotherhood and the Enclave to aim for the exposed neck area, and the legs the knee caps were always some of the weakest armor for the sake of user mobility soon there were several wounded troopers lying on the ground as their comrades tried to get them away. However everyone could here the whining of the vertibird's engines starting up the Lieutenant leading their patrol decided there was only one option for them to catch the Black Vipers before they took off again, charge. The troops charged the compound sending a man back to their commander to bring up reinforcements to support their charge. With the men nearing the fence that blocked off the base the Enclave troops still up began to open fire, cutting down several of the troopers as they charged, behind them in the field the Enclave flew over napalming the whole field, blocking off their exit and killing the man sent to grab reinforcements. Realising this was a fight to the death the cavalrymen threw caution to the wind and charged forward into the Enclave ranks, killing the few men still up and finishing those off who lay wounded. As they charged across the base they suddenly began to take fire from one of the massive cement guard towers that surrounded the base, the Lieutenant called for Norman along with two other troopers Mack and Tommy to go knock out the tower's defenses. They were given a few pulse grenades and ran to the tower as the others carried on, the three began to creep up the tower when an Enclave trooper in full power armor burst through the door to the main level, he quickly was hit by a barrage of bullets ripping apart his knees and even catching a chunk metal in the neck. He collapsed and after Mack kicked off his helmet he got to the the head. They continued up onto the main floor of the guard tower where they found three troopers and their sergeant laying down heavy fire using their Gatling Lasers and plasma rifles on the troopers below. They chucked tow pulse grenades at the power armored troopers and knocked out their auto-gyros turning their power armor into steel coffins. As they burst through the door the Enclave officer un-effected by the energy pulse fired his plasma pistol at the troopers striking Mack in the chest and Tommy in the head. Norman leveled his Service Rifle with the officer and put two through his chest, as he collapsed he went to help his fallen comrades but only to find that there was little he could do as they both died of blood loss they gave him their ammo and grenades, telling him to go get those Enclave bastards. Norman running down the steps and out onto the runway quickly met up with his comrades. They were being held up by a squad of Heavy troopers armed with heavy weapons and in Hellfire Power Armor the Lieutenant split his forces leaving a few men to keep the heavy troopers busy while the rest flanked through a nearby hangar to outflank the Enclave and reach the runway. As they sprinted through the hangar they encountered a squad of Enclave troopers sent to flank them, these men were however without power armor and were easily dispatched by the troopers. They burst through the hangar doors and onto the runway running as hard as they could, the Enclave having activated the old Pre-war security system flooded the whole run way with security robots. As the troopers charged to stop the vertibirds the bots and other Enclave personnel opened fire cutting down the troopers as they charged the runway. Quickly it was only the Lieutenant and Norman as they charged, the others were locked in a grapple with the Enclave Heavy troopers or dueling with the security bots. However the tow made it to the vertibrirds who were preparing to lift off, the two men began to heave their pulse grenades at the vertibirds frying their electrical systems and rendering them unflyable. The Vipers weren't going anywhere, behind them there was a blast of a bugle and suddenly the whole rest of the regiment came charging through overwhlming the remaining Enclave troops and destroying the security bots. The Air base had been captured and the Black Vipers finally put out of business, Norman, the Lieutenant and many other members of their patrol were given awards and were celebrated as heros within the regiment. Norman would go on to serve a very long and tough career in the army however he would eventually retire when he was posted to be the Commandant of a prison camp for captured tribals and Enclave war prisoners. he was age 30 and already a Major. Phantom of the Wastes Sheriff Norman Herrick The Baja Killers Norman Herrick for President! Equipment Write the second section of your page here. Presonality Appearances Quotes By About